Take AAI's

and see how informed you are!

Let's End "Witchhunt" Persecution in Uganda

Of course, there are no such things as witches or witchcraft. However, "Witchhunts" are regularly conducted by self-anointed Christian Evangelical "Healers" for their own gain and fame throughout Africa, with tragic and often fatal results for the victims who are usually the most vulnerable in the community.

TIME TO BRING AN END TO BLASPHEMY LAWS!

By going to the ICABL websiteyou can find news on victims of Blasphemy laws from all around the world, including an interactive map with detailed information on the countries’ blasphemy laws and consequences.

Join as a Member

Donate

Sign up for AAI's

free mailing list

Some schools in east London are being taken over by Muslim extremists who are trying to convert pupils and staff to their hardline ideology, according to a report in today's Sunday Times.

The newspaper spoke to a contact within the Department for Education (DfE) who clams the problem there is even worse than in Birmingham, where a 'Trojan Horse' plot to take over schools was revealed this year.

"Tower Hamlets is expected to be the next Birmingham," said the DfE source, "but even worse, because the problems surrounding Muslim fundamentalists imposing their views on education seems to be more embedded."

According to Huffington Post, Stephen Hawking says he's an atheist, arguing that science offers a "more convincing explanation" for the origins of the universe and that the miracles of religion "aren't compatible" with scientific fact.

"Before we understood science, it was natural to believe that God created the universe, but now science offers a more convincing explanation," the celebrated physicist said in a video posted by Spanish newspaper El Mundo. "What I meant by 'we would know the mind of God' is we would know everything that God would know if there was a God, but there isn't. I'm an atheist."

ISTANBUL (AFP) – When Turkish pupils received their school entry exam results after the end of last term, textile worker and father Halil Ibrahim Beyhan received a surprise that was unpleasant to him.

His daughter had been assigned to a religious high school, like thousands of other students under a new system that caught many parents off guard.

According to Aquila Style, parents, educators and civil society groups have decried the move as another attack on Turkey’s secular principles by the Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP) co-founded by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, accusing the government of imposing religion on students.

Several recent raids on Sydney and Brisbane homes have brought to light a dangerous extremist ring of Islamic ISIL/ISIS supporters with plots to carry out terrorist attacks, including a plot to abduct and behead a random member of the Australian public on camera.

Law enforcement officials have told journalists that they are worried about civil unrest after these raids, as “the people who normally calm down the hotheads are not here”. Whilst the Islamic community has come together in many displays of anti-extremist ideologies, subversive voices continue to flood into the community. Australia is now joining numerous other countries that are currently dealing with Jihadist recruiters, encouraging young Islamic Australians to partake in warfare in Syria and Iraq, taking money and people to the Middle East to waste on a religious war costing lives and sanity.

The current tension in Brisbane is pliable, with the G20 summit around the corner. Anti-terrorist measures are clear around the city, with even common trash receptacles being welded shut to prevent terrorist attacks.

With other Islamic Australians coming out publicly in favour of the ISIS/ISIL terrorist group, it is unknown how many more raids and terrorist threats from religious institutions will have to be thwarted before the terrorist threat level in Australia is lowered to a less unsettling standard: for the first time in eleven years the alert is "high". Unfortunately Australia’s more secular and multicultural way of life is being threatened by some of the very people who came here for those freedoms.

According to Inquisitr, gay rights are not a thing in one particular region of Muslim-majority Indonesia, not by a long shot. Under a new proposal in Indonesia’s Aceh province, gays face 100 lashes with a cane if caught engaging in homosexual acts. This would apply to both Muslims and non-Muslims in the region. The proposal is expected to pass as soon as Monday.

The Deputy Mayor of the Aceh province, Illiza Sa’aduddin Djamal, has been pushing for the measure against gays since at least May of 2013. Her province is the only area of Indonesia that enforces Islamic Sharia Law. Implementation of Sharia has been gradual since its introduction in the northwestern province of Indonesia in 2001.

Acoording to RT, the Austrian authorities have stopped two schoolgirls who were willing to leave the country and join the jihadists in the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS). A third girl was planning to join them, but was stopped by her mother.

A 14-year-old girl and her friend, 15, both from Vienna, were earlier reported missing, said Interior Ministry official Alexander Marakovits.

The third girl, who is 17 years old, was planning to join them in Graz, the second-largest city in Austria. However, her mother became suspicious of the large suitcase she was taking and stopped her from going.

Atheists long enjoyed watching Christopher Hitchens “slap” believers, especially during formal public debates. But debaters accepting Hitch’s baton must likewise prepare diligently or get “slapped” themselves during debates. In the following article, Liz Emery offers valuable insider’s advice to atheists intent on debating Mormons. Raised and homeschooled by Mormon parents in Utah, Liz served in multiple Church leadership roles and was accepted to study at Bringham Young University. She instead attended Utah State University, where she wrote a weekly column for the university’s newspaper. Today she lives in Chicago, but continues to study the Mormon Church.

The recent debate between biblical literalist Ken Hamm and scientist Bill Nye has raised an old question: Is it useful for atheists to debate believers, or do debates give unnecessary validity to irrational arguments? Religious arguments rest solely on faith, not scientific evidence, and debate formats do not allow secularists to conduct a course on epistemology. Victor Stenger has argued convincingly that debates favor Christian apologists who regularly perform in front of audiences and that atheists face a formidable task in preparing properly.

According to Gulf News, eight men arrested in Egypt for appearing in a “gay marriage” video that went viral on the Internet have been referred to trial for inciting debauchery, judicial sources said on Monday.

Homosexuality is not included in a list of sexual offences explicitly outlawed by Egyptian law, but it can be punished under several different statutes on morality.

Seven of the nine men identified from the video were arrested on September 6. They tested negative after they were put through medical exams to detect whether they were homosexuals.

A Pennsylvania teenager faces up to two years behind bars after posting pictures to Facebook in which he simulates receiving oral sex from a statue of Jesus.

The unnamed 14-year-old says he posed with the statue, which sits outside a Christian organization in Everett, Pennsylvania, called Love in the Name of Christ, in late July. The pictures are being used as evidence that the teen may be guilty of desecrating an object of veneration.

According to Zee News, Egyptian authorities have ordered the arrest of nine men who appeared in a video purporting to show the country`s first gay marriage, accusing them of inciting debauchery and undermining public morals.

Gay marriage is not legal in Egypt, a conservative Muslim society where the footage, which went viral on social media sites last month, has caused a stir online.

In the city of Wuppertal in Germany a group of Salafist Muslims have created a squad of "Sharia Police", enforcing Sharia Law during the night in the city.

There is no surprise in the message of the Sharia Police:

"No gambling, no music, no alcohol, no kafirs."

According NBC News, small groups of hardline Salafist Muslims have been patrolling the streets of a German city hoping to "influence and recruit young people," police said. The groups were seen in the western city of Wuppertal wearing bright orange reflective vests with "Shariah Police" on the back. "This was seen as a violation against Germany’s public assembly law and charges were filed,” police spokesman Andre Schwanicke told NBC News. Officials say they have increased the police presence in the city.